Timekeepers to have a ball with landmark repairs

Published on Friday 10 October 2008 10:25

CALTON Hill's famous Time Ball is to be restored, along with the Nelson Monument upon which it sits, 18 months after the city landmark was damaged by heavy gales.

It was a feature you could set your watch by for more than 150 years and now repair work is set to begin, thanks to a 50,000 Heritage Lottery Fund grant.

The Time Ball was installed by Charles Piazzi Smyth, second Astronomer Royal for Scotland with the assistance of clockmaker Frederick James Ritchie in 1852.

Its purpose was to enable ships' captains in Leith docks to set their chronometers accurately. Nine years later the One o'Clock Gun at Edinburgh Castle was added, to give an audible signal, and the pair have worked in tandem almost without interruption ever since.

However, in March last year the ball was put out of action during heavy gales that battered the Capital.

City culture leader Deidre Brock yesterday climbed the 178 steps to the top of the landmark, to inspect the monument before the restoration work begins.

She said: "Edinburgh's Time Ball is an important piece of maritime history and helped many a vessel plot a safe course across the open seas in years gone by. We are delighted to be able to have it restored to its former glory."

The conservation work is estimated to take around six months to complete and is expected to cost around 230,000 in total. A large iron band is corroding inside the stonework at the top of the monument and causing movement. It is likely that this will have to be taken down and reconstructed. Further fundraising continues and it is hoped work will start in the new year.

The Nelson Monument itself will also see work, with some stonework repair and replacement, and extensive re-pointing in lime mortar.

Museums and monuments conservation officer Paul McAuley said: "The heavy winds blew off part of the weather vane, and the ball itself was unstable. It was sliding down at an angle, scraping the central column as it dropped so it was taken out of action so it could be restored to conservation standard."

Since 1852 the Time Ball has been operated by an employee of Ritchie & Son Clockmakers of Broughton Street. The ball itself weighs 762kg and consists of a timber sphere sheathed in zinc, which rises and falls around a central timber post.

Richies' managing director Alan Wilson said: "It's a very important part of Edinburgh's timekeeping history. In the past it used to be connected to the One O'clock Gun by a 4000-feet telegraph wire that stretched all the way from the Castle to the Nelson Monument. This was removed in the 1930s so for the last 80 or so years we've just had to rely on the puff of smoke from the gun to know when to drop the ball."